Texas Tech Regents honor slain officer from El Paso

Regents of the Texas Tech University System honored Officer Floyd East Jr. and his family on Friday morning with a resolution in East's memory while meeting in his hometown of El Paso.

The regents meeting opened with the tribute to East, who was killed in the line of duty at Texas Tech's main campus in Lubbock.

But he began his career at TTU Health Sciences Center El Paso as a guard, so it was HSC El Paso President Richard Lange who talked about East.

"Officer Floyd East was an El Paso native," Lange said, pausing for a long moment before resuming in a shaky voice.

He noted that East was a guard at HSC while he attended El Paso Community College Law Enforcement Academy in 2016. Then he transferred to Lubbock to complete his field training, which he did on Aug. 31.

East's career was cut short on Oct. 9 when he was shot by a Texas Tech student.

"Officer East was a dedicated police officer who truly cared about the communities he worked in," Lange said, noting that East chose law enforcement to help make communities safe.

Lange said officers and first responders from across the nation came to a memorial center at the Abraham Chavez Theater, which was filled by officers, the campus and the community to pay tribute to East.

Tech President Lawrence Schovanec read the resolution for the regents, which expresses the regents' heartfelt appreciation to East and his family for his loyalty, dedication and character.

As the entire room rose to applaud, Schovanec presented a framed copy of the resolution to East's wife, Carmen, and his daughters, Ana and Monica.

"The family has been in our hearts and our thoughts for a long time," Chancellor Robert Duncan said.

He said the way the Tech students reacted to the shooting, with an outpouring of support for East and law enforcement, will never be forgotten.

Duncan transitioned into talking about more Tech history, pointing out that while March 2 is Texas Independence Day, it is also the date that the forerunners of the regents, the Texas Tech College directors, met for the first time in 1923 in Sweetwater.

The Texas legislature, Duncan said, had passed a bill creating the university, but they didn't name a city initially.

The bill "put it west of the 98th meridian and north of the 29th parallel," Duncan said. "I don't think there was a train station that was headed to Lubbock, Texas that day."

So the group first met in Sweetwater.

Duncan said it is fitting that the regents met in El Paso this week because it fits the legislature's original vision of the new university serving West Texas.

In other business, regents approved an agreement with ESPN to purchase 25,000 tickets at an average cost of $125 and 1,000 student tickets at a cost of $40 each for $3,165,000. Tech will then be allowed to sell the tickets directly to its fans for a game against University of Mississippi on Sept. 1 at the NRG Stadium in Houston.

ESPN Productions Inc. will pay Tech $3,750,000 for its participation in the event.

The least possible revenue for Tech for the game against Ole Miss would be $585,000, according to Noel Sloan, chief financial officer and vice president for administration and finance at Tech.

"The Ole Miss game is scheduled as a one-year agreement," Athletic Director Kirby Hocutt said.

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